Steady
by Kaitsy
Summary: Missing Will/Alana scene from the finale. She is the even, calm sea on which Will could thrive.


**Little one shot I wrote to fill in that missing scene between Will/Alana in the finale. This is the first time I've written Hannibal, and just exploring Alana's character further - I love her and think she's really an important, great, strong character. It's kind of sad and heavy on the melodrama. Ah, also I'm not entirely sure of the timeline of where it would fit, but I improvised. Anyway, here it is.**

* * *

Alana stood at the sink, features pinched, as she palmed two aspirin and sipped some water. She had just returned from meeting with Jack and Hannibal after hearing Will had escaped the transport vehicle...in nearly the same way Abel Gideon had so recently...aside from the strung up human organs, that is.

Greeting the dogs piled in her living room, she didn't remove her shoes before seeking out painkillers because her head throbbed. So much weeping and yelling lately, but after talking to Will and then Hannibal (and seeing the clock Will drew for her), she at least felt they were at the root of Will's problem. Encephalitis, maybe. She didn't know how Hannibal had missed the signs, didn't _want _to know because she didn't need to be angry with, nor blame him, on top of her worry for Will. But if they could find him, and they could treat him, he would get _better_ and – Well, she supposed, just the small fact of murder to contend with.

Abigail Hobbs.

Her head throbbed again and she winced, inhaling a sharp breath and considering opening a bottle of beer to supplement the aspirin. She ached with grief for the lost girl, but something about it felt empty, felt impossible. She also felt a consuming guilt, as if she'd slaughtered both Abigail and Will herself, because at this point she felt it was a damned team effort. Alana refused to grapple with the details of Abigail's death, believing something was hidden about the whole thing, and hoped to get to the bottom of it before letting reality set in.

A noise from her foyer stopped her on the way to the fridge. Alana was a person aware and very present and despite all that was going on, she let her senses guide her and she could just _feel_ that it was him.

She crept around the corner of the kitchen and into the living room and although every instinct within her should have been screaming otherwise, she softened at the sight of Will Graham bent down to greet his plethora of dogs, that raised not a ruckus when he entered her home. She wondered that, if the dogs saw nothing different in him, why should she? If they still trusted and loved him, rather than turning on someone who had murdered an innocent person, shouldn't she? Not her most cohesive train of thought but the tails wagging around him led her further into the room.

_He's dangerous_ a voice in her head said, not her own and not one she really believed, a cold analytic tone that was speaking based on evidence alone. _He's dangerous and just broke out of a secure police vehicle_. The same voice reminded of her cell phone in her pocket but she didn't reach for it and instead made her presence known.

_He's dangerous and killed Abigail Hobbs._

Will looked up in the midst of patting all of the dogs. He looked worse than she had seen, and that was saying something, considering the times she had seen him on the brink – wandering through a field in mid-morning together looking for an animal that didn't exist, covered in dirt after knocking a hole in his own chimney for the same reason, bloodied and scratched and in jumpsuit because – _Abigail._

_Defensive wounds on his arms, she fought back –_ No.

"You can't be here, Will," And her voice was steady because as upset as she was, as much as she'd cried and screamed, Alana was steady, that was her core. Steady, even, smooth, strength, reason – so many things in her which Will Graham valued and needed.

"You think I'm dangerous," He said, maybe reading her mind, maybe in her mind like the way he was in the mind of all of those killers until – until, _too close_...

"The evidence...says that I..._know _you're dangerous." Alana said pointedly, and at this he stood and she noticed he was still in the orange jumpsuit, a dark wool coat thrown over top. Oh, he was wandering around like an escaped fugitive and looking like one, too. For someone so brilliant...

"And you believe the evidence." Will all but spat and Alana's lips parted in response but she found none because how could she trod down on him any further? He couldn't remember _murdering_ someone and was accused of, maybe, murdering many others. A serial killer without even knowing he was one – was that it? Could that _possibly_ be it? Will was some madman and all of the murders he had worked on, he had really _done_? No, Alana shook her head internally. Whatever they tried to say, _no,_ it was nonsensical.

"I never said that." She offered, quietly, and his Adam's apple bobbed as he struggled with words or feeling or _something_ and he looked lost for an entire minute before meeting her eyes again. Forlorn, he looked. Hopeless, of course he'd be hopeless right now.

"I don't think you do believe it because you haven't called Jack yet."

"Will, I don't want to believe anything they've told me but you can't remember otherwise, so what am I supposed to do? I won't call Jack but you're a fugitive."

"Does this make you an accessory?" He asked and if this wasn't so serious she would wonder if he was joking, but he looked legitimately concerned.

"I wouldn't worry about it because everything will get turned upside down when you get assessed. I think you've very sick."

His hand leaped to his face, habitually, and he scrubbed his stubble and darkened eyes with it until he looked across the room at her again.

"Unstable," He said quietly and Alana pressed her lips together, struggling not to gather him up in her arms and keep him hidden, because she knew that was wrong, she knew he needed help, and that authorities would be seeking him. "I feel unstable but – not so much that I...that I don't _remember_, all of those...Alana, I couldn't have,-"

"I don't think so either," She assured, and his expression was momentarily wild as he seemed to consider the victims of the copycat killer, that were spooled into his fishing lures and then he squeezed his eyes shut, perhaps trying to forget, perhaps trying to remember.

"You said _when_ I'm assessed – I can't go back," Will said, but she noticed that he looked tired and beaten down, and she doubted he had it in him to run for long. There was a deadened look in his eyes that betrayed his words of defiance – couldn't he go back? His defeated gaze suggested he already had, in his mind at least.

"Okay," Alana said quietly, approaching him, her steps loud on the floor, but he didn't blink.

"Do you want some aspirin, Will? I just took some myself."

He squeezed his eyes hard and flexed his neck, uptight and uncomfortable in his own skin.

"No, my head doesn't hurt like that, it's whirring, though," He clenched his jaw and his hands were in fists at his sides and he was so tense, so wound up and overwhelmed that Alana thought he may snap (although, apparently, he already had).

"Understandable," She was upon him now, and she was drawn to him despite those weak protests of her subconscious about his nature, about his danger. Drawn to him in this way she had always been, and had always worried about because it was nearly inevitable. She wasn't surprised about what she felt for him because she'd been avoiding it for so long. Will, he had so much to give, if he had the chance...

Alana widened her eyes, gently, expressing herself to him through the flutter of her lashes, rather than using words, and he guarded himself, hunched his shoulders, but she touched his hand and blinked up at him. He needed to calm down. She was trying to push out images of poor, troubled Abigail struggling in his hands as he killed her, and trying to forget the same hands had threaded bits of other victims into fishing lures, and instead ease both of their minds just then.

"Take a breath, Will, stop holding it," And she was right, he had been, and it whooshed from him shakily as she touched his face. She was steady, she steadied him, and his chest expanded as he inhaled slowly.

_What did you do_ she wanted to ask him, as she knew so many had lately, but it was useless because there was nothing in him that knew the answer.

She didn't believe he could kill Abigail, but she didn't know what other answers there were. Abigail's ear...her blood beneath his nails...her scratches on his arms, which Alana could feel as she touched her fingertips to his wrist...what else was there, who else would hurt Abigail and set Will up? She couldn't fathom any of it, and she tried not to speculate too far, for her pragmatic mind knew it wasn't helpful to do so.

"They seem to like it here," His voice was gruff and his eyes were closed, lines that tugged at the corners were smoothed out as he focused on his breathing. Alana put her hand against his chest and felt his heart thud strong against her palm.

"There's lots of room for them to run, too," Alana agreed and he jerked his head in what she thought was a nod, such a normal motion that seemed painful for him.

"I just had to see them, see," Will's voice wavered, and he swallowed and then it held a flirtatious edge despite the mess he was in. "To see you."

"I'm going to help you however I can." She couldn't let herself fall right now, not while she was vulnerable, Abigail was dead, and Will was spiralling.

_You're not broken_, she had once said and she tried to see him clearly, see him objectively, to decide whether – whether he was still not broken. But she couldn't see anything else, just then. He just...needed to get well, to be healed, and then let's worry about the what next.

"You say I'm sick. If its treated...maybe that will help me remember," His forehead slid down and rested against hers, and was warm and clammy against her own skin.

"Maybe,"

"Georgia Madchen couldn't remember, and she...she did it,"

"We need to see what's going on with you before we start talking like this. Because if we start talking like this, right now, Will, I don't think I can do it,"

She felt him go still against her, and she realized that Will couldn't have her faith in him shaken, because perhaps that was the last straw. Perhaps he'd lose his own determination to prove he couldn't – he hadn't –

"Breathe," Alana said again and she pulled back from him, too close (_you said he wouldn't get too close)_ to him and their eyes met, blue on blue, and his were clear, so clear, why couldn't his mind be the same (because it was inflamed)?

Will picked up the starfish pendant on her necklace that rested against her chest, tangled in her scarf. Some expression, some lost time, some different life, etched across his features and he looked at peace, almost, gentler and less tormented than practically all the time she'd known him.

"Maybe I could escape by boat," He said, twirling the golden charm between his fingers.

"Doesn't seem practical," Either did this, either did they, standing there in her living room as if he hadn't just overthrown a prisoner vehicle and took off on foot, as if he were just simply admiring her necklace, that reminded him of the ocean he loved so.

"No, but living on the sea does...living by the sea does."

"I spent a lot of time at the coast growing up, too,"

"Yeah? I dream of it, sometimes. A simpler life." He pressed the necklace back down, his fingers lingering against her skin, making her heart thrum a new beat.

"You'll get back there," And Alana was just whispering words of comfort, whether she believed them or not, because there was no sense telling him he may never see the ocean again, for all they said he had done, he could be locked up for life.

"That's optimistic," He scoffed, forehead creasing again and Alana just dreamed of a day where the man smiled, for he seemed so robbed of livelihood these last long weeks. "Maybe I'll just think of it, to get through...sit in a cell, dream of the water. Maybe I'll think of you there with me."

Alana smiled sadly, wistful for a time she had never known, one with him, if things had been different, if she had thought less and he had been in the right frame of mind.

"I'd like to be there with you," How quietly she said it betrayed the boldness of the statement.

"Mmm," Will sighed, and she wondered what he would look like beside the ocean, rested and surrounded by things he loved, enjoyed, needed...oh, he could need her.

"I wanted to help her, should have helped myself first," Will groaned and suddenly withdrew from her, kneeling again amongst the dogs, an arm around Winston as the dog nuzzled into his neck.

"I should go," He said and Alana sighed, so aware of him, so aware of the magnetic draw she felt to him, wishing that things had been different from the very beginning.

She didn't know much about his time as a cop but – but maybe if he'd had guidance after he was taken off the job, maybe if she'd – it should have been her to take him on as her patient, she didn't know anymore. He was a grown man, he didn't need her watching over him, or infantilizing him, but things seemed to go quite awry no matter what.

Alana wished she could pinpoint the turning point, the point of no return, where someone, _she_, should have intervened, and she would hold it over herself. Her whole priority was for Will not to get too close and for _her_ not to get too close to him, but that distance helped no one – She had feelings for him, anyway, and he was too far gone now.

"You don't have to go yet," She smiled slightly. "I know, here I am, supporting someone on the run."

"Thanks, but I'm putting us both at risk right now and I don't think Jack would be surprised to find me here after my little revelation," Will frowned again. "Sorry about that."

"It's fine, he didn't mention it afterwards, I think he knows not to push right now. There's nothing our – your – romantic overtures," As he had put it. "Have to do with...anything at this point."

"You make me feel better, you know," And his eyes gleamed in the light coming into her living room, and she saw life there for a moment, amidst herself reflected back at her. "I don't know what I've done or...who I've hurt but you make me feel...just _better_ and that maybe it's – maybe it's no one, maybe I'm not as crazy as my sessions with Dr. Lecter make it seem,"

"Hannibal makes you feel crazy?"

"I don't know,"

"I think I should call him, Will."

"Don't. Not yet." He said before stroking the noses of each one of his dogs one last time, muttering goodbyes and be goods to them.

Alana felt like, as she watched him, standing over him crouched down on the floor, that everything could be better. She could solve her problems, his problems, all of their problems, even – maybe – Abigail, she couldn't – imagine she was gone, hurt, bloodied, no – Not when she'd survived her monster father, not when Will had softened to her and only wanted, _he just wanted to help her_, protect her, not _finish the job her father couldn't_ –

How had things gone so far as they had? How had they lost such control?

"Will you be okay?" Will asked and he really was a handsome, sweet man as he stood tall again, a head above her, scruffy and eyes puffy with exhaustion and strain. Imagine if he were whole, all he could do and see and all he could help if only, if only...

"I am okay," Alana said, and she sounded so, and nothing about her shook, not her hands nor her voice. She was the even, calm sea that Will could thrive on.

His expression didn't change.

"Do you...begrudge that?"

"No, I don't want you to need anything, or need me, I just envy you that assurance. I haven't said I'm okay and meant it for,-" He stopped, shook his head, fastened his coat. "I'll see you soon."

"That's optimistic," She used his retort and he smoothed her wavy hair behind her ear and oh, this was so familiar, this was so tempting and unfair because – was he the monster, now? Garret Jacob Hobbs was Abigail's monster of a father, was Will one, too? Alana didn't know, didn't flee as she should have when he appeared in her doorway and she knew why she hadn't, she worried why she hadn't.

She felt him coming in close again, not unlike that night he had kissed her, and she watched as if in slow motion, a spectator of her own life in the moment.

"I won't," He said, stopping short of her lips, and he was looking at them instead of into her eyes. "I want to, but I won't."

His other hand came up and grasped her face, just like that night, the same slow stroke of his thumb across her cheek, the other holding onto the back of her neck. Alana took a breath, the first unsteady thing she might have felt, and leaned into the sensation, soft and soothing.

"You can," She breathed, her stomach already surging with regret, her innards protesting so much that she was surprised she wasn't shaking her head. The last thing they needed was this, now, the last thing she should welcome was _this, now, _but Will, damaged, determined, Will...

Her hands were clutched together at her middle, and when his lips ghosted...skimmed but didn't touch...over hers, she gripped the hem of his coat, seeking the warmth that he radiated, although it was cold he felt. She slid them up to his chest, acknowledging the shallow breaths he took. Her eyes were heavy and lidded, desire and mistakes warring over her. She smoothed her lips together, imaginary remnant of him upon them. He smelled like the outdoors, the woods he had trekked through, and she thought for him that was quite normal.

"I won't." He said again, decided, and he meant it, that brief, teasing taste of his mouth the only kiss he would give, warm and sweet, tingles crawling down her spine. Such a gentle, charming murderer was he, if he indeed was one. But, no, if he indeed was one it was because he had spent one moment too many in the demented mind of Garret Jacob Hobbs, and she couldn't forgive him that, couldn't ignore that, but Will, this man, could never, _would _never –

Alana would learn, in the near future, of another man that could never, would never do something like that, but, in fact, had done something exactly like that – and it would become hard to believe in anything or anyone afterwards.

But Will wasn't that man, wasn't Hobbs or Hannibal. His heart pumped warm blood, filled an empathetic, intelligent person, and she could see a future for him even if no one else could.

There was more to the story, she knew there must be and would not rest until she knew it, until the uneasy feeling, the half truths they were fed, were gone.

"Don't do anything stupid," She pleaded as he pushed away from her, his thumb tracing down her cheek, across her lips, before doing so.

"I just – need to find out,"

"Will, don't _do anything stupid_," She repeated, not knowing what he meant, not knowing where he intended to go.

"Stupider than this, you mean?"

"That's exactly what I mean because you're not in trouble yet, but if you go looking for it,"

"I just need to know."

He was away from her, across the room, and maybe now was the time for declarations, or action of some sort, but Alana was not about to lose herself now, to lose that composure she had so far kept. Everything around him had crumbled and – she knew she wasn't his, nor was Will hers, but she would only be more apart of him now, rather than less. She had tucked away the smallest part of herself that worried for him only and now it was only growing, it was only closer to love than ever before.

"Are you scared of me?" He asked, the dogs trailing after him, half-hearted with their tail wagging now, ears standing with curiosity, watching him leave them again – leaving her again.

"I'm not, but I'm scared for you. Be safe, Will."

"I'm sorry – to trespass, I-"

"For God's sake, Will, it's fine,-"

"Alana," He said her name and how could a man so in pieces make her feel whole with his damaged, confusing presence.

"Good luck." And her voice quavered but she didn't shed any tears this time, the image of him in a jumpsuit one she would have to get used to.

One last meaningful look and he was out her door, and she watched from the window until he had disappeared again before she took out her phone and called Hannibal.

The mender or creator of problems, she did not know.


End file.
